Engineers set to discuss their role in development at a conference in South Coast

Some of the Engineers who attended a dinner event in Nairob in August, 2019. Photo/COURTESY.

MOMBASA, Kenya Aug 30 – Engineers from across the world will be trooping to Kenya’s South Coast this weekend ahead of the 26th edition of the Institution of Engineers of Kenya International Engineering Conference to be held at Leisure Lodge.

The event will take place from Tuesday September 3-6 and is expected to be opened by President Uhuru Kenyatta. The theme of the conference is “Overcoming The 21st Century Challenges: Implementing sustainable regional and local development agendas, taking into account global best practices.

The President of the Institution of Engineers of Kenya, engineer Collins Juma said delegates will be discussing the role of engineers in providing solutions to challenges in areas like water services, energy, transport, housing and health.

“We will have people from engineering institutions in Africa and beyond. We have invited engineers to come and exchange ideas, new designs, new innovations, and to learn from the best practices from one country to the other,” says engineer Juma.

The first day of the conference is dedicated to the place of women in the engineering field which remains male dominated. IEK statistics indicate that women form only 7 per cent of the registered members of IEK. The institution has 6,444 registered members out of which only 436 are women.

“At the women summit we will focus on how to deal with this challenge and one of the key issues is to build capacity for women. We want to explore opportunities for women engineers, we want to encourage women to join engineering as a profession, says engineer Jane Mutulili, first Vice President of IEK.

The second vice president of the Institution engineer Emelda Odhiambo further says, “The myth that engineering is only for the men is something of the old. You don’t require muscle to do engineering, what you need is just the brains.” She says.

Emelda adds that women constitute 50% of the population and there’s no way an event like the engineers’ conference can discuss challenges of the 21st century without including women.

According to the honorary secretary of IEK engineer Nathaniel Matalanga the Institution will at the same time be campaigning for representation on the executive board of the World Federation for Engineering Organisation.

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“We want to show them that given a chance Kenya can also represent Africa and international community in the top organisation of engineers in the world.” Notes engineer Matalanga.

The elections will take place on 23rd November 2019 in Melbourne, Australia at the General Assembly of the World Federation of Engineering Organisation.